Originally posted by Rabbi Joe Black Opening Prayer For the Colorado State House in the Aftermath of a Tragedy February 15, 2018

Our God and God of all people,
God of the Rich and God of the poor.
God of the teacher and God of the student.
God of the families who wait in horror.
God of the dispatcher who hears screams of terror from under bloodied desks.
God of the first responder who bravely creeps through ravaged hallways.
God of the doctor who treats the wounded.
God of the rabbi, pastor, imam or priest who seeks words of comfort but comes up empty.
God of the young boy who sees his classmates die in front of him.
God of the weeping, raging, inconsolable mother who screams at the sight of her child’s lifeless body .
God of the shattered communities torn apart by senseless violence.
God of the legislators paralyzed by fear, partisanship, money and undue influence.
God of the Right.
God of the Left.
God who hears our prayers.
God who does not answer.
On this tragic day when we confront the aftermath of the 18th School shooting in our nation on the 46th day of this year, I do not feel like praying.
Our prayers have not stopped the bullets.
Our prayers have changed nothing.
Once again, a disturbed man with easy access to a death machine has squinted through the sights of a weapon, aimed, squeezed a trigger and taken out his depraved anger, pain and frustration on innocents: pure souls. Students and teachers. Brothers and sisters. Mothers and fathers- cut down in an instant by the power of hatred and technology.
We are guilty, O God.
We are guilty of inaction.
We are guilty of complacency.
We are guilty of allowing ourselves to be paralyzed by politics.
The blood of our children cries out from the ground.
The blood of police officers cut down in the line of duty flows through our streets.
I do not appeal to You on this terrible morning to change us. We can only do that ourselves.
Our enemies do not come only from far away places.
The monsters we fear live among us.
May those in this room who have the power to make change find the courage to seek a pathway to sanity and hope.
May we hold ourselves and our leaders accountable.
Only then will our prayers be worthy of an answer.

I think that this person has the right idea. If Republican lawmakers are so convinced of the efficacy of "Thoughts and Prayers," then they should be receiving T&P for campaign contributions, not money.

Apparently, a few people have followed her example:

__________________
“The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.”

I actually found the music changes distracting and unnecessary, especially knowing more than a few conservative folks where that's exactly the sort of nitpick they latch onto as justification for ignoring the entire point.

And to clarify (I hope) I do criticize 'scary music' choices when doing these sorts of side by sides or in documentaries. What I mean by offering an irrelevancy is putting forth some complete bit of nonsense non-sequitur that when the opponent latches onto it and behaves they are rebutting the entire thesis in rebutting a red herring, that even they themselves know they're making fools of themselves, yet powering through nonetheless in a rush of adrenaline and lust for winning a fight on the internet.

Something I haven't seen a good explainer on, is that the NRA and Rick Scott and Trump and others want to say:

It's all the fault of the FBI, they got calls about him
It's all the fault of the local sheriff, the police got calls about him AND his deputies didn't rush in (of course, AR-15s are very high powered and without appropriate body armor that is extremely dangerous)
It's allnot at all the fault of the Florida Department of Children and Families which investigated him and concluded no action needed to be taken (because FL DCF is under Republican Rick Scott's authority, so let's not be hasty)

But left out of these is under what laws they should've taken action. Sure, the police probably could've done more, they could've gone to his house and talked to him (certainly, police usually don't have any problem coming out to talk to "random black guy walking on the sidewalk who a white person called the police about but isn't accused of doing anything aside from being 'suspicious'"). But the NRA and the GOP oppose most laws that would confiscate guns.

Trump's tweet there is basically saying "You should've done what the Republican Party has very pointedly not made legal. If you do this to the wrong person, we will label you a gun grabber and call for your resignation and/or an investigation."

Imagine if the police had confiscate Bundy's guns, for example.

Since I don't trust the GOP to operate in good faith, it's hard for me to know what the police and FBI could've done, legally speaking.

I think your issue is that you're looking at this from a logical standpoint. The purpose isn't to come up with a logically consistent or coherent explanation. They're just flailing wildly for a scapegoat that isn't guns, or America's (or Florida's) lax gun laws. Blaming the FBI/local law enforcement for not enforcing laws that don't exist means attention to something other than guns, even if that something is their logical incoherence. (They're also used to people just blindly accepting their proclamations, no matter how ridiculous. They probably have no idea why it isn't working now.)

I mean, I completely agree with your critique. But these people are appealing to pure lizard-brain id. Fortunately, most of the country isn't falling for it anymore, and the Stoneman Douglas students aren't even allowing themselves to be distracted by it. Perhaps we could all learn something from them. When I'm not on my phone I'll go look for Dalia Lithwick's (IIRC) article about their strategy and why it's been working, and edit it in later.

The fact that their explanation is so logically incoherent even by their standards seems like a good sign, BTW - it means they're panicking.

__________________

“All for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind.” -Adam Smith